Cleaning-Up - Camilla Basham

I celebrate the dawn of my thirty fifth birthday nude, disoriented, gagged and duck taped to a mid eighteenth century Queen Anne arm chair under a crystal chandelier, and the impression that I should have left much earlier the previous night at the first site of cocaine and firearms.

It wouldn’t be so bad, except I’m due at a noon PTA meeting where I’m expected to pass out homemade brownies, copies of a revised fourth grade parent’s phone tree in case of a national emergency, and loving pats on the little tikes’ malformed brains; my own brain so soar I can’t even remember the name of the school. I can’t even remember the fucking date.

This doesn’t happen to me often: the memory loss, that is. The duct tape is another story. It’s all part of the test. Part of proving I won’t break, won’t divulge our purpose, won’t sabotage our cause. It’s obvious I didn’t break, as I’m still breathing, and assume that being left in this ridiculous position is Aaban’s idea of a joke.

I look around for signs of life to discover turned over chairs, remnants of cocktails, ammunition, golden damask curtains blowing in the wind, discarded brown glass vials and the slightly plastic smell of cut cocaine.

I hear footsteps in the near distance and see a young Latino woman cleaning up the mess. I murmur and stomp my taped feet together in unison. The sight of me causes her to drop her broom and run from the room.

My cell phone rings from somewhere behind me. It must be Tim, home with the kids thinking my ladies night out with the Oprah book club ran late and I spent the night on Janine Abernathy’s sofa in the suburbs afraid to drive home after one and a half glasses of Zinfandel. What a shmuck!